The use of decoys in hunting water fowl is a time honored and proven technique to entice birds. Innumerable types of decoys have been used. However, all decoys suffer from the same basic problem; namely, they are difficult to deploy and retract. Deployed individually, decoys tend to bunch together because of wind and wave action or drift away as they are moved by wave action. Thus, a hunter can realistically maintain control over a few decoys at a time.
In the past, several solutions have been presented for deploying and retracting groups of decoys. For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,246,574, 2,616,200, 2,624,144, 4,660,313, 5,074,071 and 6,655,071.
The time and effort needed to deploy and retract decoys becomes daunting as the number of decoys increases. Given that waterfowl hunting season is in the fall and winter, decreasing the amount of time spending deploying and retract decoys is highly desirable. However, use of a large numbers of decoys would be desirable in order to better attract waterfowl. In addition, storing numerous decoys is problematic because of the tendency of the decoys to become entangled with each other.
The present invention overcomes one or more of these problems.